3 ms·

Do infections really matter though? Shouldn’t we focus on total deaths per country? I think we are trying to minimize deaths, not infections.

jetpackjoe 6y ago
Deaths, but also hospitalizations.
matthewmacleod 6y ago
the Scandinavian nation ranks eighth among countries with the highest number of COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 people
rbecker 6y ago
Not necessarily. If you're trying to decide which quarantine measures to take, and you look at only deaths, then your findings will be skewed by how good the medical system in the countries you examined is. Or in other words, jumping from the balcony is a bad idea, even if the doctor can patch you up afterwards.
joe_the_user 6y ago
Aside from Deaths, Covid can cause permanent organ damage. People have talked about the uncertainty involved in this virus as reason to not shutdown economies. But this kind of argument misses the danger involved in exposing many people to a fairly intense disease where it's not just the death rate that will harm the people and indirectly harm society. Headline: "Three-quarters of adults with COVID-19 have heart damage after recovery". See: https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/07/27/Three-quarters-of-adults-with-COVID-19-have-heart-damage-after-recovery/5451595856303/?ur3=1 https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/07/27/Three-quarters-of...
- lbeltrame 6y ago
  > Aside from Deaths, Covid can cause permanent organ damage. So can other diseases we live with, we're just not that exposed to them through the press. Certain diseases can cause heart failure; bacterial pneumonia, even if treated, can have effects that last for months if not a year or more; some viral infections can cause all sorts of bad side effects, including cytokine storms. This including the recent interview with someone who had a lot of their fingers amputated due to cardiovascular complications from infections: this also happens to quite a few who have type 2 diabetes (due to neuropathy). A lot of treatable diseases can have long lasting, sometimes even crippling effects in life. Many people just don't know because it's not told around. This virus is no different from them.
  - jddj 6y ago
    Right. This one, though, seems to be much more adept at spreading through communities than your run-of-the-mill bacterial pneumonia or type two diabetes. That must factor into your equivalence test, no?
    - lbeltrame 6y ago
      Yes, but the easiness it spreads does not equate to the same frequency of long-lasting damage. In fact, given so many cases are missed (bloodstream antibody tests don't catch those with T-cell responses, and mucosal antibodies aren't detected by those tests, either) I would not be surprised if those with complications are a minority (of extreme clinical importance, mind you) of the total cases. My point is not much as to downplay the seriousness of these side effects, but rather that we have become more aware of them due to "information overload", because many other diseases can have these complications. IOW, this is not a magic disease (sometimes the press almost paints SARS-CoV-2 as something out of this world...).
      - joe_the_user 6y ago
        Hopefully those with complications will turn out to be a minority but we are talking a disease whose parameters haven't been fully discovered. The "magic" of COVID is that combines the seriousness of many serious diseases, like more conventional viral pneumonia, that do long lasting damage with an infectiousness greater than the flu - so even minority with organ damage can be many, many people. It's not the worst disease in the world but the point one should be concerned with the number of cases rather than just fatalities.
ojhughes 6y ago
I agree, the infection rate in many countries such as U.K. is a finger in the air due to lack of testing especially early on in the pandemic where it was almost impossible to get tested. Also, many people will only get tested if they have severe symptoms.

jetpackjoe 6y ago

Deaths, but also hospitalizations.

matthewmacleod 6y ago

the Scandinavian nation ranks eighth among countries with the highest number of COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 people

rbecker 6y ago

Not necessarily. If you're trying to decide which quarantine measures to take, and you look at only deaths, then your findings will be skewed by how good the medical system in the countries you examined is. Or in other words, jumping from the balcony is a bad idea, even if the doctor can patch you up afterwards.

joe_the_user 6y ago

Aside from Deaths, Covid can cause permanent organ damage. People have talked about the uncertainty involved in this virus as reason to not shutdown economies. But this kind of argument misses the danger involved in exposing many people to a fairly intense disease where it's not just the death rate that will harm the people and indirectly harm society. Headline: "Three-quarters of adults with COVID-19 have heart damage after recovery". See: https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/07/27/Three-quarters-of-adults-with-COVID-19-have-heart-damage-after-recovery/5451595856303/?ur3=1 https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/07/27/Three-quarters-of...

lbeltrame 6y ago
> Aside from Deaths, Covid can cause permanent organ damage. So can other diseases we live with, we're just not that exposed to them through the press. Certain diseases can cause heart failure; bacterial pneumonia, even if treated, can have effects that last for months if not a year or more; some viral infections can cause all sorts of bad side effects, including cytokine storms. This including the recent interview with someone who had a lot of their fingers amputated due to cardiovascular complications from infections: this also happens to quite a few who have type 2 diabetes (due to neuropathy). A lot of treatable diseases can have long lasting, sometimes even crippling effects in life. Many people just don't know because it's not told around. This virus is no different from them.
- jddj 6y ago
  Right. This one, though, seems to be much more adept at spreading through communities than your run-of-the-mill bacterial pneumonia or type two diabetes. That must factor into your equivalence test, no?
  - lbeltrame 6y ago
    Yes, but the easiness it spreads does not equate to the same frequency of long-lasting damage. In fact, given so many cases are missed (bloodstream antibody tests don't catch those with T-cell responses, and mucosal antibodies aren't detected by those tests, either) I would not be surprised if those with complications are a minority (of extreme clinical importance, mind you) of the total cases. My point is not much as to downplay the seriousness of these side effects, but rather that we have become more aware of them due to "information overload", because many other diseases can have these complications. IOW, this is not a magic disease (sometimes the press almost paints SARS-CoV-2 as something out of this world...).
    - joe_the_user 6y ago
      Hopefully those with complications will turn out to be a minority but we are talking a disease whose parameters haven't been fully discovered. The "magic" of COVID is that combines the seriousness of many serious diseases, like more conventional viral pneumonia, that do long lasting damage with an infectiousness greater than the flu - so even minority with organ damage can be many, many people. It's not the worst disease in the world but the point one should be concerned with the number of cases rather than just fatalities.

ojhughes 6y ago

I agree, the infection rate in many countries such as U.K. is a finger in the air due to lack of testing especially early on in the pandemic where it was almost impossible to get tested. Also, many people will only get tested if they have severe symptoms.